Racist thread

[ThejoyofNC]

There is a thread running in AIBU where people are being openly and freely racist. You've already deleted several posts on there so you're aware of it. Why are you allowing it to run?

Also why do you allow racism against travellers on here?

@PandoraSocks started a thread “Concerns about racism” in Site Stuff a few days ago - it rapidly filled up, not least because of concerted efforts to derail the thread with half truths and disinformation. Those posts were mostly carefully worded - in isolation most would pass a quick look.

The threads which inspire these discussions in Site Stuff are being overloaded by volume posters of half truth and disinformation which is largely left to stand. Some of these posters are posting at the rate of a 100 posts a day around the clock whilst ostensibly looking after a couple of DC and a full time job. They are not just one liners either but the bulk of posts are on “political” threads with a few odd posts to other topics.

How do you monitoring hyper active posters like this, where individual posts carefully sit inside the rules whilst spreading disinformation at volume? What steps do you have in place to detect shills and deal with them lobbying on a topic?

“Challenge on thread” assumes most posters are (a) genuine users (b) posting in good faith. In the case of protected characteristics it also says “justify your existence in this place”.

She had her reasons to settle down and married from outside her community so she does have some negative perception based on her own lived in experience.

@sesquipedalian can you see that it would be racist to say "a family of black people came to stay in our village and left behind an enormous amount of rubbish that cost the council a huge amount to clear up" - the fact that they left a lot of rubbish would be true but is not due to the race of the people in question. It is because they are antisocial people. Phrasing the statement to include information about their race implicitly attributes their behaviour to their race. Prefacing the racist statement with "I have nothing against black people but..." does not stop it from being racist. The issue is the behaviour so talk about the behaviour without reference to race.

Some of these posters are posting at the rate of a 100 posts a day around the clock whilst ostensibly looking after a couple of DC and a full time job. They are not just one liners either but the bulk of posts are on “political” threads with a few odd posts to other topics.

And a great number of them - I can name three right this second without even thinking about it, and I rarely even notice user names - are having multiple posts banned on multiple threads over weeks and weeks and have not been banned or even suspended.

If I can see that how do moderators, whose job it is to spot such things and deal with them, manage to constantly miss it?

Anyway - they'll all be along with their racist "it's free speech" malarkey any minute now and this thread will turn into another echochamber of racism unchallenged by MNHQ.

Another example would be the posting of one reported number against a dog whistle.

eg coupling the published statement such as 40,000 on the Prevent list and with a comment about “people coming from terrorist states” which is regular dogwhistle for brown migrants. The names of the “”terrorist” states are not supplied but lets face it - they are not accusing the white majority Western sponsors of terrorist groups.

Having linked migrants and terrorists are brown the clear implication is that 40,000 names on the list are brown migrants when in reality one of the biggest upticks in recent years are incels and far right terrorism. The security services have regularly flagged up far right groups as the top security threat over the years.

But just read the one comment and you go away with the idea that 40000 brown migrants are potential terrorists from the list.

I think whilst there are people who genuinely believe nonsense like this, we've got no chance of equality. It was absolutely bizzare

The 40,000 strong watchlist doesn't even seem to exist.

Farage has announced today that:

The uni-party has completely failed to keep women and girls safe.

This is the next big issue in British politics

It is quite the coincidence that the site has been spammed with hateful posts about asylum seekers being rapists in the week leading up to this, isn't it?

I have some negative lived experience, but I wouldn't accuse the majority of white, English, working class men of being domestic abusers and rapists.

Yes. Remember the Lorena Bobbitt story went all around the world, and that was pre-internet I think?

From memory, the Prevent programme at one point mentioned something like 40,000 names but the context was in a discussion about the big increase of incel reports. The number was then extracted from context and merged with a dog whistle.

It is quite the coincidence that the site has been spammed with hateful posts about asylum seekers being rapists in the week leading up to this, isn't it?

I am all astonishment. Just as I’m astonished at the posters who can post 100 times a day on these subjects whilst wrangling a family and a full time job.

Doesn’t Prevent cover the whole spectrum of terrorist ideology? Not all 40,000 names would be Islamist fanatics, which is what the ridiculous thread in question is clearly suggesting.

It was actually MI5 - in 2020, the Home Office said there were over 40000 people where MI5 judged there was some risk of them re-engaging in terrorist activity. In other words this is a list of people who are not engaged in terrorist activity (and this may be from a number of sources, including the far-right). It is typical misdirection. "We have a list of 40,000 names, but we can't tell you who they are, why they are on it and they are actually not engaged in anything - but they might be one day..."

I can pull together a list of 40000 names too...

That rings a bell and to answer @MrsSkylerWhite the list includes all groups across a range of risk levels. The security forces have often reported right wing extremism are topping that thread list - doubtless all brown right wing extremists and arriving on boats. 🙄

There you go, giving people facts! How very dare you?

For people who like facts:
Of the 6,922 referrals made to Prevent in the year ending 31 March 2024:

• 893 individuals (13% of referrals) were discussed at a Channel panel, and 512 individuals (7% of referrals) adopted as a Channel case went on to receive Channel support; and looking in more detail at the journey of individuals referred, this represents a decrease when compared with the previous year despite the overall number of referrals increasing
• the proportion of referrals being discussed at a Channel panel has decreased (13% this year versus 16% last year and 23% the year before) while the proportion of referrals that were adopted as a Channel case also decreased (7% this year versus 9% last year and 13% the year before)
• the Education sector made the highest number of referrals (2,788), accounting for 40% of all referrals this year; this is similar to last year and this is the highest proportion for any source of referral since data was first published in 2015 to 2016
• referrals by the Police (1,921; 28%) fell by 1% compared with the previous year, marking the first time referrals by the Police have fallen year-on-year since 2020 to 2021; while referrals from the Community increased by 36% (from 115 to 156) and referrals from HMPPS fell by 16% (from 267 to 225)
• 6,884 referrals were made to Prevent where the age of the individual was known, and those aged 11 to 15 accounted for the largest proportion (2,729; 40%); while those aged between 16 and 17 accounted for the second largest proportion (892; 13%) of referrals
• 511 cases were adopted by Channel where the age of the individual was known, with individuals aged between 11 and 15 accounting for half (50%) of cases adopted by Channel
• as in previous years where sex was specified (6,906), most referrals were for males (6,114; 89%)
• the category ‘Vulnerability present but no ideology or CT risk’ accounted for the largest proportion of referrals (2,489; 36%)
• for the fourth year running, the number of referrals for ‘Extreme right-wing concerns’ (1,314; 19%) is greater than referrals for ‘Islamist concerns’ (913; 13%); this marks the first year since 2019 to 2020 that the number of referrals for Islamist concerns have increased compared with the previous year
• the majority of referrals that went on to be adopted as a Channel case were for ‘Extreme right-wing concerns’ (230 out of 512; 45%); while 118 (23%) were for ‘Islamist concerns’ and 90 (18%) were for those with a conflicted ideology

For clarity, conflicted or unstable ideology is where someone becomes fixated on more than one type of extremism or terrorism, e.g., an interest in extreme far right and extreme Islamist ideologies even though they seem opposing, and also including those fascinated with "mass harm" without connection to a clear ideology (like school shootings). In other words, that is really a category for people who like violence for no reason other than liking violence.

Just to add to the facts, I have tracked down the 40,000 reference. As PG says it is the number of clised SOIs. It also includes people who have never even entered the UK.
Posting this here for the next time someone twists the facts:

Link to report

www.gov.uk/government/publications/transparency-report-disruptive-powers-2018-to-2019/hm-government-transparency-report-disruptive-powers-2018-to-2019-accessible-version

Sorry @ThejoyofNC we have somewhat derailed your thread.

But it's all very interesting. Useful for when certain posts pop up and we are just supposed to "challenge in thread"

I agree - and thanks for that info @PandoraSocks - so effectively a SOI may in fact be nothing more than some other countries opinion anyway, and may or may not be true. That certainly explains a list of 40000 albeit worldwide. In many ways it is our version of Trump's "gang members".

The problem with “Challenge on thread” for protected characteristics under the law is that its telling us to justify our existence.

For most users MN is a leisure activity, maybe a place of support, not another place to justify our existence. To use the aged usenet pub analogy - we go to online communities because they are interesting and enjoyable places to be, not to sit at our table trying to hold a conversation whilst the people with no interest in genuine engagement come in to shout and throw bottles. Who wants that?

Fair point @C8H10N4O2 I can't say I liked the response to just challenge on thread - it seems to resolve MN of responsibility and doesn't help us much.

For information purposes the first state sanctioned discriminatory laws in England against gypsy's was around the 16th century. That law said they must all leave the country or be put to death.

Rolling on to the 1960s and the repealing of a law forcing local authorities to provide transit site accommodation for gypsies - absolutely necessary to have transit sites as the majority travelled looking for work - mostly fruit picking and other seasonal work. Along with this was a lot of other casual camps were unavailable following the enclosure and new responsibilities re commonland. This left gypsy's who travelled unable to find campsites which is where we are today.

They really are the most maligned group. For example complaining about them leaving rubbish - the rest of us get it collected from our doorstop, why can't they?

As for some of views on here - they are so racist and mumsnet are complicit in that by allowing rhetoric and racist posts to remain. They need to tighten up their moderation - their idea of free speech and allowing debates on racism is fine but I'm sure members of those racial groups on the receiving end hold different views.